https://www.yahoo.com/health/want-to-exercise-harder-try-drinking-beet-juice-124844319703.html
Want
to exercise longer without feeling wiped out? A new study suggests
adding beet juice to your diet. The research, published in the American Journal of Physiology-Regulatory, Integrative and Comparative Physiology,
zeros in on nitrate, which is found in beet juice and converted to
nitric oxide in the body; the molecule has the ability to more easily
dilate our blood vessels and increase blood flow.
A press release
on the study explains exercisers who consumed beet juice experienced
this effect both while doing a progressive cycling exercise and while at
rest. Blood pressure was lowered and the heart needed less oxygen
during the workout, which led researchers to conclude that beet juice is
“capable of enhancing O2 delivery and reducing work of the heart” so
exercise can be “performed at a given workload for a longer period of
time before the onset of fatigue."
Better
still, this bump can apparently be achieved in short order: The study’s
14 male participants drank beet juice for just 15 days.
The findings contrast those in a Penn State study
from January; researchers found the juice "had no effect on the
dilation of the brachial artery” among volunteers tasked with doing
handgrip exercises, though they did find an “artery de-stiffening
effect."
Researchers
did note some potential contributing factors: participants were very
young and healthy, for instance, so their "vascular endothelial
function” was in great shape to begin with. Second, they completed “a
relatively small range of forearm exercise intensities”; it’s possible
dilation would occur during a higher intensity workout. (Want to test it
out? Here’s how much beet juice you should try drinking.)
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